Robots, Dinosaurs or Aliens?

“If you could choose to be raised by robots, dinosaurs, or aliens, who would you pick? Why?”

For me this question implies a simple answer: “I would choose dinosaurs, because they’re cool.” But I am not one who takes implications to simplicity very easily. Especially when it comes to the question of how I would choose to be raised.

First off, I would have to wonder why my parents aren’t raising me themselves. Am I to assume that I am not human in this instance of the question posed? Is it, in fact asking if I would rather be a robot, dinosaur or alien? I would have to answer to that: no. I am in fact a human being from the planet earth. I answer this way because whoever is posing this question, besides being a fool, to me is a) assuming that I understand that there is a marked difference between each of the options, and that b) with the inclusion of “robots”, this is something that in my time and my era is something that can not procreate, (yet), and thus shows that the poser realizes this and so, the question is viable to me: a human being.

The other thing I have to wonder is: Would I have this choice as an infant or be able to choose when I was a bit older to understand the implications of my choice? I would have to understand that I could not possibly choose as an infant. Even if I was given this choice as a young person who could talk and communicate on a higher level of needs, who are these people giving me this choice? How did we, as an advanced civilization come to the point of giving 5 year olds the choice to be raised by robots, dinosaurs or aliens? Or, am I to believe that some advanced thinkers proposed an experiment involving the choice a child would make as to who would he choose to raise him? Obviously as a child I would pick the dinosaurs; because they are cool. But, how ridiculous a scenario! But, I suppose that is the point, no?

The third thing I would have to consider is, would these “choices” all have the understanding of the responsibility that they are raising a human child? Sure the robot possibly would and the alien might. But, could I imagine that other humans would place me in front of a dinosaur or that my parents, on a trip to some dinosaur land, lost me to the wilderness, and as the dinosaurs came upon me, wouldn’t in fact eat me, but lovingly raise me as one of their own? Well, I would have to believe that the dinosaurs, come back to life of course, were at such an advanced stage of intellectual development that they could raise a child of their own, be it human or baby dino.

Obviously, the more I delve into the reasons for why this question was posed to me, the more ridiculous the question appears to be. But, since this is a question posed on an application for acceptance to a University of which I am so eager to be a part of, that I would have to assume that this is designed to make flow the creative juices inside my wonderous brain and provide an answer that would wow the evaluators, whether my answer is simple, direct or on such a complexly higher level of intelligence, that you would all be fools not to accept me into the ranks of Brandeis elite. Perhaps I fall somewhere in between all of these. For, since I have now written almost four paragraphs, my answer is not simple, and since I have to evaluate the reasoning behind the question posed, I am not direct, and I know that there are those tens, maybe hundreds who have intellects that surpass mine, so I am not so advanced as to assume you are all not fools and see the horrible structure and arguments of my sloppy writing, and that last can not be true.

So, simple, direct or intellectually complex? That is what I pose to you.

I give you all, and I give you none.

I would choose to be raised by aliens. I believe that all these choices would want to see me survive, for the term “raised” means that they care enough to bring me into adulthood. I would not choose robots, because I would become cold and callous, not knowing love. The true love that is only realized in human to human contact or on a smaller scale, biological creature to biological creature contact. I would not choose dinosaurs, because I would be too primal. I would have to believe that you would want to uncover some sort of characteristics that I would want to emulate, and reactionary, primal dinosaur is not one. Here I am assuming much, for no one has seen the true behaviours of dinosaurs, at least in the sense of what we understand them to be now. For dinosaurs could have all ran around with flowers in the hair, spouting verse and song about merry dino maidens all awaiting their love to come and rescue them from the pits of despair, and tar. But, I am looking at the current beastly understanding. That you would have me say, “Dinosaurs are cool! And I can run around roaring and pooping and eating whatever and wherever I wanted.”

So, aliens are my choice. For since they are able to come to me from distant stars, they could take me to distant stars. They could show me the universe I would never be able to see with dinosaurs or perhaps even robots, because they do not understand what it means to have your heart desire to go beyond where you are. I could understand all their behavior and accept it as my own, because they have seen the wonders of the universe and know how small we really are. Perhaps they would even be capable of love. Which all of us desire and need in the small lives we live here on earth.